


214782

by Moviemuncher



Category: X-Men First Class - Fandom, X-Men: The Movie
Genre: Character Study, Holocaust, Tattoo, possible triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-24
Updated: 2015-11-24
Packaged: 2018-05-03 06:15:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5279894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moviemuncher/pseuds/Moviemuncher
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Small little mark on his arm, so small. Innocuous ink, the remnant of a horror that set his life on one tragic course. Frankenstein's monster had his stitches, Erik Lehnsherr had his blemishes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	214782

**Author's Note:**

> This does mention the Holocaust and may contain some triggers or may be upsetting.

214782

Small numbers on his arm and Erik can't erase them, can't cover or forget them. He tells himself they don't matter, but they do.

He tells himself that he is just a mutant now, that's what he must devote himself too.

Anti-Semetism was still common, he watched a group of young men hurl insults at a group of women leaving a synagogue, a month after Cuba. They wouldn't be doing so anymore. Erik didn't understand why it still hurt, why did it still hurt? 

He gets labelled a criminal, a terrorist in the news. He never hears the term "freedom fighter" though, not once. The homo sapiens don't see the irony in what they're doing to mutants and what Hitler did to Jews like himself and his mother twenty-years or so ago. 

214782

People start to notice his tattoo scar.

Erik starts wearing long sleeves, weather did not affect this. He'd endured more than discomfort in white and blue pajamas than any long-sleeved shirt. But he didn't want people knowing that.

Raven notices, but she doesn't ask. 

He's glad, because he doesn't want to look weak in front of the girl who needs his help. Who wants help from a man who can't even help himself?

214782

He reads a poem, he can't remember where. 'Dulce et Decorum est' by Wilfred Owen. "If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace behind the wagon that we flung him in" sticks in his head. He remembers the "special unit" that cleared the gas chambers. Wheelbarrows loaded with bodies, if those young men had seen that, then maybe they would have reconsidered their choices.

214782

In the end, these numbers matter very much. He's not just a mutant, he's a Jew, a father too. He had ideals and morals regarding racism, equality and homphobia, he finds that Freddie Mercury inspires him, Martin Luther King too. 

He's not just one thing. He has many facets.

He wouldn't have those if not for the cracks Shaw and the Nazis gave him.


End file.
